Wastewater treatment systems, such as municipal and commercial wastewater treatment systems may provide for the treatment of wastewater from residential, commercial, or other uses. Wastewater treatment systems may variously include wastewater collection systems and/or wastewater treatment facilities. Generally, a wastewater collection system may receive wastewater from a point of use, such as a residential home, a business, and/or commercial facility and may transport the wastewater to a wastewater treatment facility. The collected wastewater may be transported using any combination of gravity conveyance and pumping to transport the wastewater from various collection points to, and even through, a wastewater treatment facility. Generally, a wastewater treatment facility may include one, or a variety, of treatment processes that may, for example, separate solid materials, biomaterials, and the like from the water and/or may perform other processes that may render the processed wastewater suitable to rejoin the environment, such as an environmental water supply, like a river or lake, or an environment land-based return.
The operation and efficiency of a wastewater treatment system may be influenced by a variety of factors, including factors that may impact the ability to collect and/or transport the wastewater, may impact the ability to carry out wastewater treatment processes, and/or impact the service and/or maintenance requirements and time of wastewater collection and/or processing systems and equipment. Factors that may impede the transport of wastewater throughout the system, decrease the efficiency of treatment processes, and/or increase service or maintenance requirements of the wastewater treatment system may increase the operating cost of the wastewater treatment system. For example, a decrease in efficiency may result in increased energy costs to operate the wastewater treatment system and/or a decreased throughput of the wastewater treatment system. An increase in the required service and maintenance may result from expenditures in equipment repair and replacement and the number of maintenance man-hours that may be required to keep the wastewater treatment system operating at an acceptable level.